I READ THE KNIGHT'S TALE as an exploration of some aspects of the paradox I stated at the end of Chapter 1: Selves are isolated from each other and yet engaged in an interpretive process in which they define each other. I shall begin with the modern questions about the tale and then suggest my answers to them by discussing the tale's treatment of interpretation as it mediates between selves who are isolated and yet intertwined.

The recent critical debate about the Knight's Tale focuses on the questions of the order of the universe and the place of human beings within it. Is the cosmos benignly ordered, and are death and destruction really part of a larger cycle and therefore ultimately good? When human beings try to make order, are they reflecting the harmonious grand scheme, or are they fooling themselves? If they are fooling themselves, is this ultimately good or bad? To recast these questions in terms more specific to the tale: Is Theseus's First Mover speech, in which he describes the ruling principle of the universe as a chain of love, an echo of the harmony of the larger scheme or a fiction he invents? If it is a fiction, is his aim to secure his people against despair or to secure his position as ruler of Athens? Is he making a leap of faith or trying to save his own skin?